


Pondposal

by Induurisa



Category: X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: But Not Much, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, I'm a sucker for these two, Jean is amazing, Kissing, Marriage Proposal, Modern Era, One Shot, Romance, Scott is adorkable, What's new, also a bit uptight, but what's new, i just love them okay, some slight angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-14
Updated: 2019-07-14
Packaged: 2020-06-28 09:25:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19809421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Induurisa/pseuds/Induurisa
Summary: Jean has been eerily silent in Scott's head one afternoon, and he has a bad feeling. He goes to find her by the pond on the mansion grounds and isn't quite met with the battle situation he'd been preparing for.





	Pondposal

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a tie-in short story for a condensed multiverse Marvel RP and edited to make more sense without the whole context. In the RP, our heroes decided to take a vacation to Disney, so that is mentioned.
> 
> (For some context, though, the RP involves a hero group chat. Scott hasn't proposed to Jean, but they've been in an established relationship for some years. Characters are a mish-mash of their comic, TV, and movie selves. The Phoenix/Dark Phoenix saga has occurred, but think the '90s cartoon version of it where it's the happy ending and everyone goes home fine at the end. Mostly.)
> 
> (Also in the RP, Bobby loves messing with Scott, often stealing his phone and texting from Scott's number. He also knows that the Scott has been meaning to propose to Jean for some time.)

I’m not liking how things have developed. I haven’t spoken to Jean since I sent her to talk to Bobby. I’ve checked in, but she hasn’t said a word. It scares me. I’ve gotten so used to feeling her in my head—that warm presence that sits in the back of my mind, that comforts me when I need it, that listens to me when I can’t even listen to myself, that tells me what’s what when I don’t know what to do. And she’s still there—but not like before. Like she’s pulled away from me.

I quickly swap out my ruby quartz shades for my battle visor—I always carry it with me, just in case, and I have extra glasses and visors in the second drawer on the right in my desk—never can be too careful. I can’t shake my uneasiness as I run from my office and down the hall, out the back door of the mansion, and down the path that leads to the pond in the back. There are trees all around it, so I can’t tell if what Charles said was true.

_< Do not fret, Scott. Jean is just fine. You’ll find her by the pond.>_

That’s all he told me, and I asked for more, but he simply urged me to go. And so I am. God, Charles. Care to make me more scared? What if something happened? What aren’t you telling me? Where is she? I’m running. Sprinting. Searching through the cover of the trees for her. Everything is red, and it’s hard to tell through the leaves. But no—there she is.

I see her.

Sitting on one of the benches at the side of the pond, hands in her lap, alone. She seems fine from a distance—she’s staring out across the water, and there are a pair of Canada geese there, floating lazily along beside one another.

_< Hello, Scott.>_

_JEAN!_

_ <Quiet down, dear. I’m right here. Come. Sit with me.>_

I keep running without stopping until I’m right there beside her, looking her over for any sign of harm. I can feel her more strongly in my mind again—the warm presence flutters and then settles more comfortably than before.

“Jean, are you alright? Talk to me. Where have you been? You disappeared. Are you okay? Is something wrong? I—”

“Scott, sit down and shut up.”

“Wha—”

I feel like a pair of heavy hands suddenly push down on my shoulders, but I know it’s just Jean’s TK as she shifts her body and turns to me on the wooden bench as I’m unceremoniously shoved onto it next to her. She tilts her head and then shakes it as she reaches towards my face to take my visor between her hands. I instinctively squeeze my eyes shut.

“Jean—”

“You don’t need this, silly. Put on the glasses. It’s okay.” She takes my visor from my face and places it on the bench beside her before reaching into my jacket pocket and unfolding my shades, slipping them over my nose as she plants a kiss on it right after. “Open your eyes, Slim.”

I do, and she’s still right in front of me. God, she’s so beautiful.

“Are you okay?”

“Let me show you,” she says simply, and I nod before leaning forward as she scoots closer to me. We bump knees, and she clasps her hands in mine as she leans her forehead up against mine.

And then she shows me.

_A living room in a house. Jean’s house. I see through her eyes as she looks at me for the first time. I see myself standing awkwardly, uncomfortably, behind Charles’ wheelchair as he and her parents discuss the school and Jean’s possibility of attending. I know the thought that had been running through my head nonstop from the moment I saw her._

_“Wow.”_

_She teased me about it when we started getting closer._

_Through her eyes, I see all the color I couldn’t back then. I see her red hair tumbling down her shoulders. She was wearing a yellow sundress then. I couldn’t tell before. I study my own image and see the polo Charles had picked out for me, the khakis, the sneakers, the outfit that was still so uncomfortable at the time. I’d grown used to too-big thrift store t-shirts and roughed-up jeans, too-big shoes found in a dumpster behind Winters’ apartment. I study my own image and I don’t know what she saw in me._

_And then we aren’t in the living room anymore, we’re in the study with Charles, Hank, Bobby, and Warren. I’m still looking through her eyes—she’s sitting at the front of the class, and I see Warren staring out the window wistfully while Bobby doodles in his notebook. Hank, attentive as ever. And then her gaze shifts, and there I am again. I remember this. I’m slouched in my seat, but listening, glancing over at Jean behind my red shades, certain at the time that she hadn’t noticed, not behind the ruby quartz lenses. She had._

_Our first time in the Danger Room. I wince instinctively at the color scheme as I see things through Jean’s perspective—it hadn’t looked_ that _bad through a red filter, but the yellow and blue now were horrendous, even to someone of my objectively poor fashion sense. I see the team standing together as Jean enters last, see myself turn to look at her, still slouching. Still unsure. I perked up when I saw her. My back straightened. And at the end of the first exercise, her gaze lingered on each of us, and then on me._

_Then she takes me to our first day in the field. I remember this particularly well. Charles had assigned me as the team leader after seeing my performance in training. My command. My eye for strategy and tactics. He’d gifted me_ The Art of War _at the end of that meeting, and I’d stayed up late reading it in one night. But here we were, staring down Magneto, and Jean lets me feel her fear through the memory. I hadn’t known. All I’d thought about in that moment was what we had to do. Fear had slipped away from me, replaced by a singular goal. I watch as she raises her hands in front of her, manipulates objects by her will alone. I see Bobby throwing up a wall of ice. Warren, soaring from above. Hank, launching himself at our foe. And then she glances at me as I shouted and opened up my visor. Red. I’ve never really seen it quite like this, from a distance, and not from a photo. It scares me._

_Jean takes us away, and I’m looking through her eyes as the five of us sit at a diner and sip milkshakes. I’m across from her next to Warren. I remember feeling so jealous of him. He’d always seemed so sure, so perfect. I watch as she looks at me—still skinny, scrawny, teenaged me—and I feel a wave of secondhand—firsthand?—embarrassment as I see myself straighten._

_She shows me everything since then, too._

_Jean takes me through the time I shakily asked her on a first date. The giddiness, the giggles, the awkwardness. When I first kissed her—and when she first kissed me. When we separated. When we got back together. The hugs at the end of a trying Danger Room sim, or after a battle. The feelings of relief, of contentedness. The growing love, the growing friendship, through trial and tribulation. She shows me times we went to the movies. Times both of us ended up in the medical bay. Times when we laughed together. Fought against one another. But there is always a string of sorts connecting all of them, and Jean shows it to me._

_She shows me…_

_Fire._

_Phoenix._

“No—”

“Scott. Shh. It’s a part of our story,” she whispers, and my eyes are squeezed shut behind my glasses as I feel her breath against my face, still resting my forehead against hers.

“I can’t—”

“If I can, then you can. I’ll help you. Let me show you.”

I’m scared. But I trust her, with everything and every part of myself. And so she takes me back.

_I see the fire. I feel the fear, but this time it isn’t my own. It’s Jean’s. My lack of control over my optic blasts seems trivial in comparison to this. I feel it all._

My hands are shaking, and she tightens her grip around my fingers.

_She shows me through her eyes my worst memories, but as I watch it all fade—as I die, briefly, with Jean—I feel what she felt. The love. It surges through me and through her, even as she shows me the fires again—the fires of rebirth. The fires of the Phoenix._

I’m crying. Jean holds me closer.

_I feel everything she felt. And she holds me close through it all as I watch her memories._

_ <Now do you see?>_

_I never wanted to see._

_ <Yes, you did. You even asked me, once. Do you remember?>_

_I remember._

_ <Let me rephrase. Now, do you _know? _>_

_I know._

_ <Yes. You do.>_

We don’t have to say anything as we sit there on the bench, entwined in each other’s arms. Tears are drying on my face—I don’t remember when they started or when they stopped. All I know is _her._ My chin rests on top of her shoulder, and hers on top of mine, and we’re in each other’s heads in a way that I know normal people can never feel. I can’t describe it. The feeling of love, of heart and mind—down from my stomach, into my throat, on my lips as I whisper the words over and over, without needing to. Her lips against my ear as she murmurs the same.

I don’t know how long we spend together like that, but the sunlight grows dim, and the geese are gone from the pond’s surface when we pull away, our hands still clasped.

_I wish we could stay like this forever. Just us. No hate or fear. No work, even. No one else but us. In this moment._

_ <I know. Me, too. I’ll add it to the records, huh?>_

I chuckle softly, wiping the back of my hand across my face as I sniff loudly. Jean smiles, chuckles as well at the sound.

“Don’t you laugh at me, Miss Grey,” I chide playfully, and she lets my hands go to punch my shoulder, bringing her knees up onto the bench and crossing her legs.

“I do what I want.”

“Including letting Bobby Drake come to Disney World, despite what he did, apparently,” I say. I can’t resist rolling my eyes.

“Ah, of course. His absolutely heinous acts of embarrassing you in front of your friends,” Jean says, tilting her head and grinning at me. I let out a sigh.

“I mean, they’re more like _coworkers_ than _friends…”_

“Admit it, Slim. You care about them.”

“I guess.”

“I _know._ ”

“I guess you do know.” We share another laugh. There are crickets and frogs chirping around us, almost deafeningly so. The sounds of summer.

“Hey, Slim. I’ve got something for you.”

“Besides the ultimate trip down memory lane, Marvel Girl?” I ask, raising a brow. She reaches behind her, where she laid her jacket, and picks it up, digging through one of the pockets for a moment.

“You know what to call me now, Slim.”

“Fine. Phoenix.” The word is strange on my tongue. I’ve been avoiding it for so long. We’d talked about it this morning a bit, but… After she’d shown me everything, I know and understand the need for the change. Rebirth. Jean looks up at me and smiles. God, that smile. It could melt the ice off of Iceman.

“That’s better. Now close your eyes.”

“What, going to take off my glasses again?” I ask lightly, but I do as she says.

“Not quite.”

I hear some rustling, and then silence as she puts her jacket down again. I feel her take my left hand and spread my fingers, palm down, on her lap.

“What are you—”

“Open your eyes, Scott Summers.” As she speaks, she slips a ring onto my finger, and I open my eyes. My heart is beating out of my chest. I glance down at my hand, then back up at her, mouth agape in something between relief, surprise, love, admiration, and… so many more emotions that I didn’t even know I could feel.

_< Scott Summers, will you do me the honor of becoming my husband? Officially, I mean. I don’t know how much more married two people can be than being in each other’s head all the time.>_

I’m speechless, and even thoughts are more wild than can be translated to words. It takes me a minute. My first coherent thought is—

_—but I was going to ask you—!_ Jean laughs, holding my hand between her palms and tangling our fingers together. I stare at the ring.

“I know. I’ve known for a long time, Scott. You’ve been thinking about it for _years._ Talk about a tease. But you’ve been thinking about it now more than ever, haven’t you? You need to work on those mental blocks of yours, Scott,” she taps my forehead, and I blink.

“But Bobby—!”

“He didn’t say a word, but he didn’t have to. You and I both know him. He looked at me, and then in the direction of your office, and then back at me before bursting into giggles. And then I grabbed your phone back and held him in midair for a few minutes while torturing him with images of that boy he has a crush on who works at the mall,” Jean says with a shrug. I shake my head in disbelief. I should have known better. Jean Grey... She knows me better than I know myself sometimes.

“I never said yes, you know,” I say suddenly, smirking at her. She makes a face at me, and I laugh as she pushes me with her TK, sending me sprawling on the bench.

_< You didn’t really _have _to. >_

“I still haven’t said it.”

“Scott!” She pushes me again.

“Whooaa!” I topple off the bench and into the grass, probably bruising something, but laughing too hard to care. “Jean!”

“Say yeeeeeeeesssss!” She says, peering down at me from the edge of the bench where she’s perched. I grin, crossing my arms behind my head.

“Make me.”

“I could do that very easily, you know.”

“Make me say it the old-fashioned way.”

“You always have been old-fashioned, haven’t you, Slim?”

“That’s what they tell me.”

“I’m not a very old-fashioned woman.”

I yelp as I’m suddenly lifted into the air, dangled upside down. I hold my glasses on my face, sputtering, as Jean laughs at me, standing on the bench with her hands on her hips and her hair drifting about her shoulders in the evening wind. She’s never looked more beautiful.

And then she drops me into the pond.

_You owe me a new phone._

_ <We’ll get you another one. Besides, Bobby damaged your old one when he iced it, anyway. I hope you’ve been using the cloud service Jubes recommended.>_

_Thankfully, I have been. Now, where is my wife-to-be? It’s lonely in here. There aren’t even any geese to keep me company._

I bob up to the surface, making sure my glasses are still firmly on my face as I run a hand through my soaked hair and start treading water. I don’t see Jean on the bench anymore.

“Jean?”

“You still haven’t said yes!” I hear her voice from above and shield my face as she plummets in a cannonball into the pond right in front of me, splashing me and sending me drifting. I spit pond water out my mouth, shaking my head, but laughing. I never want to lose this moment.

_< Gotcha.>_

Her hand wraps around my ankle underwater, and she yanks me down with her for a moment before letting us both come up for air. Our clothes and hair are soaked through. I check my hand for the ring—thank god, she knows my ring size—it’s still snugly situated on my finger. We swim towards each other, laughing and splashing at each other like when we were teens on the beach or in the pool.

“Say yes!”

“Do I have to?”

“Yes, you have to! Stop it!” She shoves a wall of water at me, aided by her telekinesis, and douses me anew. Some water gets in my nose, and I cough, weakly splashing her back. “You suck, Slim. Now come on. What do I have to do to make you say yes, hm?” Jean swims up to me, and I hold her elbows, smiling. She wipes my hair from where it’s stuck to my forehead and stares into my eyes, past the glasses. I wish, so badly, I could see her without them.

“I think you can. I’ve been practicing.”

“Jean, I don’t think—”

“Let me try.”

And so I turn away from her as she swims up close to me, gently pushing us far enough back to shore with her TK so that we can stand on the mushy floor of the pond.

_This water can’t be too clean._

_ <Hush, and let me concentrate.>_

I’m silent as she stands beside me, taking off my glasses and placing her hands on either side of my head.

“Look at the sky, Scott.”

I follow her instructions, tilting my head towards the clouds with my eyes still shut tightly. We’d practiced this a bit in the Danger Room. And gotten so close.

_< The only reason we haven’t is because you haven’t let me.>_

_I was scared._

_ <I know. Are you still scared?>_

_Yes._

_ <Then let go.>_

“Open your eyes.”

And I do. At first, there’s the same dark red evening sky as I’d seen for years. But the beams—they aren’t there. I feel Jean’s hands press against my temples as she focuses her power, but I don’t dare look down at her. It’s slightly painful. The sky gets less and less red. Until it’s not red at all.

“Jean? Did you—?” I breathe, barely hoping. The pain is getting worse by the moment, growing in my skull behind my eyes, but it doesn’t matter right now.

“Look at me.”

“But—”

“Look at me, Scott. And say yes.”

I slowly let my gaze fall, tilting my head back down to face the love of my life. I was wrong, before. She _can_ look more beautiful. Right now. I see her red hair, and her eyes—green! So green—and her shirt is soaking wet from the pond water and my own clothing is waterlogged and heavy, but I can’t look away from her eyes as she pulls me closer to her, hands still on either side of my head.

“Yes.”

My eyes are open, taking her in for another moment, and then they’re closed as we both rush in to kiss. She gradually lets go of my eyebeams, and I feel the pain subside as I squint my eyes shut. She replaces my glasses as we kiss, but I hardly notice. All that matters is us, here and now, waist-deep in pond water and soaked to the bone, and there’s a ring on my finger.

“I still need to get you a ring,” I say softly against her cheek as I hold her close to me. The moon is out now, reflecting on the pond waters.

“We can go shopping for one together. Maybe we can look at wedding rings while we’re at it,” she whispers back to me before kissing me again.

One nice thing about having a telepath for a girlfriend, among other nice things, is that you can kiss and still talk at the same time.

_I can’t believe I’m finally going to get to marry you._

_ <I can.>_

_Ha. It’s not terribly traditional for the woman to get an engagement ring for the man—_

_ <Shut up, Mr. Old-fashioned.>_

_—but I think I like it much better. I mean, how is a guy supposed to know what kind of ring to get a girl? Men’s rings are so simple, but women’s rings are a hit or miss._

_ <Good thing you won’t have to pick one for me, then, huh?>_

_Good thing. Imagine how hideous it would have been._

_ <I’m sure it wouldn’t have been _that _bad. >_

_I was even asking Logan for advice about it._

_ <Okay, maybe it would have been that bad.>_

_Your faith in me is truly astounding._

_ <I’ll always have faith in you. Just not when it comes to fashion decisions, Slim.>_

_Mm. Probably better that you make all the fashion choices around here, then._

_ <Mm-hmm.>_

I’ve long since lost track of the hour by the time we slog back to dry land and I wring out my jacket. I take my phone from my pocket and frown.

“We have extras of these, right?”

“Hm?” Jean is picking up my visor and her jacket from where she’d left them on the bench, and she turns towards me as she pushes her hair over one shoulder with her telekinesis.

“Phones. We have more of these somewhere?”

“Don’t worry about it right now. Come on. Let’s head back inside and have all the kids wondering why the hell we’re soaking wet,” she says with a chuckle, hooking her arm around mine and pulling me into a walk as I put my ruined phone into my back pocket.

“They’re going to get ideas.”

“Let them.”

“I don’t wanna.”

“I know. Loosen up, Scott. Enjoy things for a moment. Which reminds me… Disney is sounding awfully nice as an engaged getaway right now,” Jean says with a wink up at me as we walk. Our shoes squish and squeak as we make our way down the moonlit path. The height of romance.

“It is, isn’t it? Still, I’ll have to be babysitting for most of the time,” I say with a shrug, bumping my shoulder against her.

“I’ll help you. And maybe you’ll even be able to fit in a little down time. A little… private down time, too,” she says, winking at me again, more dramatic this time. I scoff a laugh and lean down to kiss her forehead.

“Very subtle, Jeannie.”

“You know it, Slim.”

And I don’t even care when Bobby ices my shoes and laughs as we make our way inside the mansion. I’ve never felt better in my life. But I know that I still have the best moment in my life yet to come.


End file.
